Making Of Good Dinosaur

The Making Of Good Dinosaur Pixar Movie 2015

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Renderman History

History

Pixar's RenderMan software has its origins in the University of Utah during the 1970s, where Pixar founder Ed Catmull did his PHD work on rendering problems. From there, the scene shifted to George Lucas' Lucasfilm in California, where Catmull and few other graphics researchers were brought in to work on graphics software specifically for use in motion pictures (a part of Lucasfilm later became Pixar).

The researchers had the explicit goal of being able to create complex, high quality photorealistic imagery, which were by definition virtually indistinguishable from filmed live action images. They began to create a renderer to help them achieve this audacious goal. The renderer had an innovative architecture designed from scratch, incorporating technical knowledge gained from past research both at Utah and NYIT. Loren Carpenter implemented core pieces of the rendering system, and Rob Cook wrote the shading subsystem. Pat Hanrahan served as the lead architect for the entire project. The rendering algorithm was termed REYES;, a name with dual origins. It was inspired by Point Reyes, a picturesque spot on the California coastline which Carpenter loved to visit. To the rendering team the name was also an acronym for Render Everything You Ever Saw a convenient phrase to sum up their ambitious undertaking.

At the 1987 SIGGRAPH conference, Cook, Carpenter and Catmull presented a paper called The Reyes Rendering Architecture which explained how the renderer functioned. Later at the SIGGRAPH in 1990, the shading language was presented in a paper titled. A Language for Shading and Lighting Calculations by Hanrahan and Jim Lawson. In 1989 the software came to be known as RenderMan and began to be licensed to CG visual effects and animation companies. Also, the CG division of Lucasfilm was spun off into its own company, Pixar in 1983 and was purchased by Steve Jobs in 1986. The rest, as they say, is history..

Even though the public offering of RenderMan did not happen until 1989, the software was used internally at Lucasfilm/Pixar way before that, to create movie visual effects, animation shorts and television commercials.

In 1982, the Genesis Effect in the movie Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan was created using an early version of RenderMan, as was the stained glass knight in the movie Young Sherlock Holmes released in 1985.

Today, leading animation and visual effects studios around the world routinely use Pixar's RenderMan thanks to its unsurpassed track record - it is fast, stable, efficient when it comes to handling large scenes with complex geometry, surface appearances and lighting. The output is high quality photoreal imagery, usable on its own (eg. in animated features) or ready for compositing with existing footage (eg. in live-action movies).

Saty Raghavachary - Dreamworks Animation

Spec

In the 'Origins' section above, we began by referring to 'Pixar's RenderMan'. This is because, strictly speaking, the word '!RenderMan' by itself denotes an interface description originated by Pixar, to provide a standard way for modeling/animation programs to communicate their scene descriptions to renderers. In other words, RenderMan is a formal specification. It is referred to as the 'RI Spec', where 'RI' stands for 'RenderMan Interface'. Pixar's own implementation of the specification was historically the very first one, so people loosely refer to it (the implementation) also as '!RenderMan'. The correct name for Pixar's version is 'PRMan' (short for Photorealistic RenderMan), and this is the name we will use for it from now on.

In a 3D graphics pipeline, rendering is the last step (after modeling, animation and lighting) that generates an image out of a scene description. Renderers are specialized, complex programs that embody a variety of algorithms which collectively lead to image synthesis. The RI Spec defines a clear separation (or boundary, or interface) between modeling and animation programs on one hand, and rendering programs on the other. The idea is that each side can focus on its own specialty, and formal 'handshake' protocol can lead to successful mixing and matching between the two. In practical terms, this means that if a piece of modeling/animation program were to output its scene description in an established format, that scene description should be able to serve as input to a variety of renderers that handle that format. All the renderers would produce pretty much the same output image from the scene description, regardless of how their internals are structured. This is because the interface specifies what to render (via geometry, lights, material and camera descriptions) but not how. The 'how' is up to the individual implementations to handle - they can freely employ scanline algorithms, ray-tracing, radiosity, point-based graphics or any other technique to render the output.

Here is a brief tour of the Spec, which is divided into two parts. Part I, 'The RenderMan Interface', begins by listing the core capabilities (required features) that all RenderMan-compliant renderers need to provide, such as a complete hierarchical graphics state, camera transformations, pixel filtering and antialiasing and the ability to do shading calculations via user-supplied shaders written in the RenderMan shading language. This is followed by a list of advanced/optional capabilities such as motion blur, depth of field and global illumination. The interface is then described in great detail, using procedural API calls in C/C++ and their corresponding RIB ( RenderMan Interface Bytestream) equivalents. RIB can be regarded as a scene description format meant for use by modelling programs to generate data for RenderMan-compliant renderers. Part II of the Spec, 'The RenderMan Shading Language' (RSL), describes a C-like language (with a rich set of shading-related function calls) for writing custom shading and lighting programs called shaders. This programmable shading aspect is one of the things that makes RenderMan enormously popular, since it gives users total control over lighting and appearances of surfaces and volumes in their scenes.

The latest version of the Spec is 3.2.1, revised in November 2005. You can find the 688K, 226 page document (which happens to make for enjoyable reading!) at Pixar's site: https://renderman.pixar.com/products/rispec/index.htm.

Be sure to get a good understanding of what is in the RI Spec - it will help you know what to expect in a typical RenderMan implementation (any renderer that calls itself '!RenderMan-compliant' will by definition be bound by the interface laid out in the Spec). In addition the Spec will serve as your reference for RIB and procedural API syntax and also for the large set of built-in functions of the RSL.

                                                                           Saty Raghavachary - Dreamworks Animation

How Pixar's Renderman software has affected the film industry

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Pixar History

Pixar Logo Image

Early History

Pixar was founded as the Graphics Group, one third of the Computer Division of Lucasfilm that was launched in 1979 with the hiring of Dr. Ed Catmull from the New York Institute of Technology (NYIT), where he was in charge of the Computer Graphics Lab (CGL). At NYIT, the researchers had pioneered many of the CG techniques that are now taken for granted and worked on an experimental film called "The Works." After moving to Lucasfilm, the team worked on creating the precursor to "RenderMan," called "Motion Doctor", which allowed traditional cel animators to use computer animation with minimal training.

The team began working on film sequences produced by Lucasfilm or worked collectively with Industrial Light & Magic on special effects. After years of research, and key milestones in films such as the "Genesis Effect" in "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan" and the "Stained Glass Knight" in "Young Sherlock Holmes," the group, which numbered about 45 individuals back then, was purchased in 1986 by Steve Jobs shortly after he left Apple Computer.[3] Jobs paid $5 million to George Lucas and put $5 million as capital into the company. A factor contributing to Lucas' sale was an increase in cash flow difficulties following his 1983 divorce, which coincided with the sudden dropoff in revenues from Star Wars licenses following the release of Return of the Jedi and the disastrous box-office performance of Howard the Duck. The newly independent company was headed by Dr. Edwin Catmull, President, and Dr. Alvy Ray Smith, Executive Vice President and Director. Jobs served as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Pixar.

Initially, Pixar was a high-end computer hardware company whose core product was the Pixar Image Computer, a system primarily sold to government agencies and the medical community. One of the buyers of Pixar Image Computers was Disney Studios, which was using the device as part of their secretive CAPS project, using the machine and custom software to migrate the laborious ink and paint part of the 2-D animation process to a more automated and thus efficient method. The Image Computer never sold well. In a bid to drive sales of the system, Pixar employee John Lasseter—who had long been creating short demonstration animations, such as Luxo Jr., to show off the device's capabilities—premiered his creations at SIGGRAPH, the computer graphics industry's largest convention, to great fanfare.

As poor sales of Pixar's computers threatened to put the company out of business, Lasseter's animation department began producing computer-animated commercials for outside companies. Early successes included campaigns for Tropicana, Listerine, and LifeSavers. In April 1990, Steve Jobs sold Pixar's hardware division, including all proprietary hardware technology and imaging software, to Vicom Systems, and transferred 18 of Pixar's appoximate 100 employees. The same year Pixar moved from San Rafael to Richmond, California. During this period, Pixar continued its relationship withWalt Disney Feature Animation, a studio whose corporate parent would ultimately become its most important partner. In 1991, after a tough start of the year when about 30 employees in the company's computer department had to go (including the company's president, Chuck Kolstad), Pixar made a $26 million deal with Disney to produce three computer-animated feature films, the first of which was "Toy Story." At that point, the software programmers, who were doing RenderMan and CAPS, and Lasseter’s animation department, who made television commercials and a few shorts for Sesame Street, was all that was left of Pixar. Despite the total income of these products, the company was still losing money, and Jobs often considered selling it, even as late as in late 1994 he contemplated to sell Pixar to other companies, among them Microsoft. Only after confirming that Disney would distribute Toy Story for the 1995 holiday season did he decide to give it another chance. The film went on to gross more than $350 million worldwide. Later that year, Pixar held its initial public offering on November 29, 1995, and the company's stock was priced at US$22 per share.

also read :  > Renderman History
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                  > Featured Disney Movies 2015-2016

RELATIONSHIP WITH DISNEY

Pixar and Disney had disagreements after the production of Toy Story 2. Originally intended as a straight-to-video release (and thus not part of Pixar's three-picture deal), the film was eventually upgraded to a theatrical release during production. Pixar demanded that the film then be counted toward the three-picture agreement, but Disney refused. Pixar's first five feature films have collectively grossed more than $2.5 billion, equivalent to the highest per-film average gross in the industry. Though profitable for both, Pixar later complained that the arrangement was not equitable. Pixar was responsible for creation and production, while Disney handled marketing and distribution. Profits and production costs were split 50-50, but Disney exclusively owned all story and sequel rights and also collected a distribution fee. The lack of story and sequel rights was perhaps the most onerous aspect to Pixar and set the stage for a contentious relationship.

The two companies attempted to reach a new agreement in early 2004. The new deal would be only for distribution, as Pixar intended to control production and own the resulting film properties themselves. The company also wanted to finance their films on their own and collect 100 percent of the profits, paying Disney only the 10 to 15 percent distribution fee. More importantly, as part of any distribution agreement with Disney, Pixar demanded control over films already in production under their old agreement, including "The Incredibles" and "Cars." Disney considered these conditions unacceptable, but Pixar would not concede.


Disagreements between Steve Jobs and thenDisney Chairman and CEO Michael Eisnermade the negotiations more difficult than they otherwise might have been. They broke down completely in mid-2004, with Jobs declaring that Pixar was actively seeking partners other than Disney. Pixar did not enter negotiations with other distributors. After a lengthy hiatus, negotiations between the two companies resumed following the departure of Eisner from Disney in September 2005. In preparation for potential fallout between Pixar and Disney, Jobs announced in late 2004 that Pixar would no longer release movies at the Disney-dictated November time frame, but during the more lucrative early summer months. This would also allow Pixar to release DVDs for their major releases during the Christmas shopping season. An added benefit of delaying Cars was to extend the time frame remaining on the Pixar-Disney contract to see how things would play out between the two companies.

Pending the Disney acquisition of Pixar, the two companies created a distribution deal for the intended 2007 release of "Ratatouille", in case the acquisition fell through, to ensure that this one film would still be released through Disney's distribution channels. (In contrast to the earlier Disney/Pixar deal, Ratatouille was to remain a Pixar property and Disney would have received only a distribution fee.) The completion of Disney's Pixar acquisition, however, nullified this distribution arrangement.

ACQUISITION BY DISNEY

Disney announced on January 24, 2006 that it had agreed to buy Pixar for approximately $7.4 billion in an all-stock deal. Following Pixar shareholder approval, the acquisition was completed May 5, 2006. The transaction catapulted Steve Jobs, who was the majority shareholder of Pixar with 50.1%, to Disney's largest individual shareholder with 7% and a new seat on its board of directors. Jobs' new Disney holdings exceed holdings belonging to ex-CEO Michael Eisner, the previous top shareholder, who still held 1.7%; and Disney Director Emeritus Roy E. Disney, who held almost 1% of the corporation's shares.


As part of the deal, Pixar co-founder John Lasseter, by then Executive Vice President, became Chief Creative Officer (reporting to President and CEO Robert Iger and consulting with Disney Director Roy Disney) of both Pixar and the Walt Disney Animation Studios, as well as the Principal Creative Adviser at Walt Disney Imagineering, which designs and builds the company's theme parks. Catmull retained his position as President of Pixar, while also becoming President of Walt Disney Animation Studios, reporting to Bob Iger and Dick Cook, chairman of Walt Disney Studio Entertainment. Steve Jobs' position as Pixar's Chairman and Chief Executive Officer was also removed, and instead he took a place on the Disney board of directors.


Lasseter and Catmull's oversight of both the Disney and Pixar studios did not mean that the two studios were merging, however. In fact, additional conditions were laid out as part of the deal to ensure that Pixar remained a separate entity, a concern that analysts had expressed about the Disney deal. Some of those conditions were that Pixar HR policies would remain intact, including the lack of employment contracts. Also, the Pixar name was guaranteed to continue, and the studio would remain in its current Emeryville, California location with the "Pixar" sign. Finally, branding of films made post-merger would be "Disney•Pixar" (beginning with Cars).

Jim Morris, producer of "WALL-E," has been named general manager of Pixar. In this new position, Morris is in charge of the day-to-day running of the studio facilities and products.

source page : http://pixar-animation.weebly.com/journal/the-history-of-pixar-animation-studios

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Featured Disney Pixar Movies 2015-2016

1. The Good Dinosaur 

The Good Dinosaur Image

An epic journey into the world of dinosaurs where an Apatosaurus named Arlo makes an unlikely human friend. What if the asteroid that forever changed life on Earth missed the planet completely and giant dinosaurs never became extinct? In this epic journey into the world of dinosaurs, an Apatosaurus named Arlo makes an unlikely human friend. While traveling through a harsh and mysterious landscape, Arlo learns the power of confronting his fears and discovers what he is truly capable of. Written by Pixar

Release date 25 November 2015 (USA), more info about release date http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1979388/releaseinfo

2. Zootopia 

Zootopia Image Cover

• In the animal city of Zootopia, a fast-talking fox who's trying to make it big goes on the run when he's framed for a crime he didn't commit. Zootopia's top cop, a self-righteous rabbit, is hot on his tail, but when both become targets of a conspiracy, they're forced to team up and discover even natural enemies can become best friends. Written by Walt Disney Animation Studios
• 
  

Release date  4 March 2016 (USA), more info about release date
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2948356/releaseinfo?ref_=tt_ov_inf%20

3. Finding Dory

Finding Dory images

The friendly-but-forgetful blue tang fish reunites with her loved ones, and everyone learns a few things about the true meaning of family along the way, "Finding Dory" reunites the friendly-but-forgetful blue tang fish with her loved ones, and everyone learns a few things about the true meaning of family along the way. Featuring the voices of Ellen DeGeneres, as Dory, Albert Brooks as Marlin, Diane Keaton as Dory's mom Jenny, Eugene Levy as Dory's dad Charlie and Ty Burrell as Bailey. Written by Pixar

Release date  17 June 2016 (USA), more info about release date

4. Moana

Three thousand years ago, the greatest sailors in the world voyaged across the vast South Pacific, discovering the many islands of Oceania. But then, for a millennium, their voyages stopped — and no one today knows why.

From Walt Disney Animation Studios comes Moana, a sweeping, CG-animated adventure about a spirited teenager who sails out on a daring mission to prove herself a master way finder and fulfill her ancestors’ unfinished quest. During her journey, she meets the once-mighty demi-god Maui (voice of Dwayne Johnson), and together, they traverse the open ocean on an action-packed voyage, encountering enormous fiery creatures and impossible odds.

 Release date  23 November 2016 (USA), more info about release date

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Making Of Inside Out

Watch Behind the Scenes of the Animation / Making of Pixar Inside Out Animated film Directed by Pete Docter.
Inside the Mind The Making of Disney Pixar “Inside Out”

From concept art to a bright and vibrant animated world, in this session Pixar filmmakers describe the process of designing, building, and bringing to life the world inside a young girl’s mind. They discuss the challenges that come with turning emotions into characters and translating the mind into an expansive set where the adventure unfolds.

also read : > Inside Out Review
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Inside Out Review

Reviewed By RICHARD ROEPER

The very best Pixar films aren’t just children’s movies with references and touchstones to keep the adults interested; they’re ambitious, complex, deeply layered movies for grown-ups that happen to be populated with characters, colors and primary stories that appeal to children as well. 
Who chokes up more at certain scenes from the “Toy Story” movies or “Finding Nemo” or “Up” — first-graders, or their parents and grandparents, who can fully relate to and understand what’s happening on all levels?

So it is with “Inside Out,” a bold, gorgeous, sweet, funny, sometimes heartbreakingly sad, candy-colored adventure that deserves an Academy Award nomination for best picture.

Not just in the animated category — in the big-kid section, right there with the top-tier live-action films. It’s one of the best movies of the year, period.

Based on an original idea by Pete Docter (“Up,” “Monsters, Inc.”) and co-directed by Docter and Ronaldo Del Carmen, “Inside Out” does a wonderful job of laying out the groundwork for the story to come in the opening sequences, in which a little girl named Riley (Kaitlyn Dias) is born in Minnesota and experiences the first few years of life.

We see Riley’s world through the emotions in her head — where we’ll be spending the bulk of the movie itself. (The story takes us outside Riley’s mind and into the “real” world just often enough for us to appreciate what she’s going through, and sometimes what her parents are feeling. It’s all done with a deft touch.)

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Our narrator and tour guide is Joy (Amy Poehler, perfectly voice-cast and terrific throughout), a sort of a whirling, glowing Emoticon-Tinkerbell hybrid who introduces us to Riley’s other primary emotions, including:

• Sadness (Phyllis Smith from “The Office”), who can literally color memories forever simply by touching them.

• Fear (Bill Hader), who views every experience as potentially disastrous, but is sometimes a valuable asset.

• Anger (Lewis Black, of course!), ready to throw a tantrum whenever things don’t go Riley’s way.

• Disgust (Mindy Kaling), who, like the other emotions, has shades of other traits. (Disgust can be quite the little narcissist.)

At first things are pretty simple and straightforward for Baby Riley, as she experiences the Joy of parental love, Disgust when she tastes broccoli, Fear of noisy household appliances, etc., etc.

But then we jump forward to Riley’s world at age 11, when the family moves to San Francisco because her father has a new job opportunity — and Riley has to cope with everything from tension between her parents to living in a less-than-desirable neighborhood to missing her friends to feeling like an outcast at her new school.

Things are getting COMPLICATED inside Riley Central.

It’s like an animated “Wizard of Oz” adventure within Riley’s mind. Riley’s memories arrive in the form of color-coded orbs and are stored away. Some of her experiences become important, influential long-term memories; others are dumped into the vast wasteland of forgotten experiences. (That’s where we meet the discarded but still fiercely loyal Bing Bong, Riley’s imaginary friend from childhood, who is voiced by the invaluable Richard Kind. Oh, Bing Bong. He will melt your heart.)

As Riley becomes increasingly sad and resentful, Joy goes on a desperate quest to regain control or at least once again become a constant presence in Riley’s life, lest Disgust and Fear and Anger remain at the controls forever.

The Pixar animation team outdoes itself with vast, intricate, amazingly detailed landscapes ranging from the “movie studio” where Riley’s dreams are produced every night (with a sly nod to Hitchcock, among other filmmakers) to Riley’s long-term memory bank (she’s forgotten nearly all of her piano lessons, but an annoying jingle for chewing gum will be popping into her head forever) to the places where Riley’s subconscious and abstract thinking reside.

Not to mention the Train of Thought, which is literally a Train. Of Thought.

Pretty complicated fare for a Pixar film — or for any film, come to think of it — and viewers a few years younger than Riley’s 11 will probably get a little fidgety and a little frightened by some of the proceedings. (Let’s just say Riley’s primary nightmare is something to which nearly all of us can relate, regardless of age.) But even if some of the references go sailing over their heads, there’s such a visual feast in every frame of this film, it’s hard to imagine any child growing restless even during the darker and more complex passages.

Directed with great flair and pitch-perfect timing, brimming with sparkling visuals, filled with first-rate voice performances, thrilling adventures and unforgettable moments, “Inside-Out” is an instant classic.

Someday the children of the children who will love this film, will love this film.

Disney-Pixar presents a film directed by Pete Docter and Ronaldo Del Carmen and written by Docter, Meg LeFauve and Josh Cooley. Running time: 93 minutes. Rated PG (for mild thematic elements and some action). Opens Friday at local theaters.

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